King Louis XI was a hated man. His passing was not mourned by his subjects and his feudal vassals undoubtedly emitted a great sigh of relief upon his expiration. Louis XI schemed, tricked, back-knifed, bribed and practiced all the numerous black arts of political skullduggery. He had no great moral difficulty with killing his brothers or his dad. He did all this in service of one unifying goal. He saved France from splitting into several, weak and quarrelsome provinces.

King Louis XI could do good things for the people of France because he was no altruist. When he did something, it actually furthered a goal. He felt no need to live conspicuously, because he truly lived. We contrast that with two messianic altruists of Modern America. In doing so, we demonstrate that modern, altruistic Liberalism is a sham, a lie, and an unmitigated recipe for epic failure. Louis XI could save France, messianic Liberals Al Gore and Barack Obama can in no way save America.

Brett Stevens, the driving force behind the outstanding “Alternative Right” blog Amerika.org, explains why the altruism of the Left is nothing but a Potemkin and will always lead to disillusionment.

Perhaps the people who shout loudest about being altruists are the most selfish.
Perhaps we should stop listening.

In the comment section I wrote a meandering screed to describe what I call the Al Gore Syndrome. (I hope Brett doesn’t take offense to me bogarting his band-width). Here’s the rough outline of what this entails.

Messianic liberals like Al Gore and Barack Obama can talk the talk and believe that this is sufficient towards doing great things. They never completely invest themselves. The example of Al Gore is definitive of the archetype.

He has four kids himself. He then tells us that anyone having more than 2 is sinful and immoral. This isn’t environmentalism, its left-wing racism and classicism. As long as you’re Al Gore, and only going to father cute little Yuppie-Puppies, you can have as many as you want. If you live in Appalachia, or The Hood, you’d better have it snipped after #2. The planet, you see, lacks the resources to support your kind.

The man wants to be a rock star, not save the world. He could truly care less about his pet issues and causes. He flies around on a private jet and enlists the Red Hot Chili Peppers to play a rock concert to convince people to burn less carbon? No he claims he wants you to burn less carbon as an excuse to get on the private jet and do tequila shooters w/ the Chili Peckers. This is before he gets his 2nd Chakra released by one of the dumb groupies.

I’m totally cool with a rich, successful man starting a large family, hanging with dumb celebrities and building mansions. Some aspects of his activity may seem morally pointless, but it sure cashes a bunch of paychecks that can be used for better and more ennobling purposes. What chaps my rear end is how he does all this stuff and then practices the sheer, moral effrontery to tell everyone else that they are not good enough human beings to do the same. This is hypocrisy rising to the level of Tammy Faye Bakker patronizing a Planned Parenthood abortion mill.

Sadly, this sort of “altruism” is practiced by our Feckless Leader, President Barack Obama. The Stimulus just would never have saved or created enough jobs to forestall epic disaster without President Barack Obama Boulevard. Like Caesar in days of old, he needs to have his august name plastered on schools (both here and in Kenya), streets (perhaps to include Calle Barack Obama in Spain), and ironically, a Jewish settlement north of Jerusalem.

People rapidly see through to the cowardice and hubris behind the façade of altruism. We see it when the Taliban unleashes a major terrorist attack in Afghanistan soon after President Obama “declares victory” and announces a draw-down. We see it when General Motors and General Electric both take large volumes of government bailout money and spend it to hire large workforces in other countries. But President Obama cares about this to the extent that Al Gore cares about his Shaquille O’Neill-sized carbon crater (oops, I mean footprint).

Louis XI did care. He didn’t care if his subjects liked him. He probably took no umbrage to being derided as “The Universal Spider.” He did care about his nation surviving, and was not concerned in the least about whether he was being altruistic towards anyone else who existed on the planet. In this sense, one of the most violent, scheming, duplicitous and vicious kings in Medieval European History was far more moral than altruists such as Al Gore or Barack Obama. This is why Louis XI could save France, while Al Gore and Barack Obama each have no prayer of saving America.